Riders Race To Provincetown On Day 2 Of Pan Mass Challenge

WELLESLEY (CBS) — The second day of the Pan-Mass Challenge kicked off in the pre-dawn hours Sunday, as thousands of riders lined up in Wellesley or Bourne to start their rides or to finish the second leg of journeys they started Saturday.

More than 6,000 people rode their bikes across the state as part of the PMC to raise money for the Dana Farber Cancer Institute.

PMC riders took off Sunday morning. (WBZ-TV)

“It’s a great experience, been doing it for a long time,” one rider told WBZ-TV’s Nick Giovanni. “Just about everything’s right in the world, lots of love out there, volunteers are awesome, people are awesome.”

In Brewster, volunteers were ready with water, cold towels, and even an “ice couch” for riders to rest and cool off on.

“This moment’s perfect, gotta ice the legs,” said a rider named Tony from Team Hope sitting on the ice couch. “The whole support is fantastic, the fans on the side of the road are just perfect, they kind of egg you on, get you over those hills.”

The PMC offers 12 different routes, ranging from 25 to 192 miles in distance. By the end of the race Sunday, cyclists will have pedaled through 46 Massachusetts towns and will have ridden over 1 million miles altogether.

Many of the riders are what the PMC community calls “living proof”–riders who are cancer survivors themselves.